Managing Your International Job Hunt – Part 2

In the second part of this two-part series on tackling your international job hunt, we look at how to manage your online brand, how to network effectively and how to prepare yourself for interviews.

- In the first part of this series we looked at planning your job hunt, doing the necessary research and updating your CV. Which you can read all about here.

1. Your online brand check – what does your brand say about you?

Checking your online brand!

Something that many job hunters forget to do is check their online brand. What search results appear on the first few pages of Google when you search for your name along with your job title or company name? Do those results reflect you in an accurate light? Will these results support you in your application for a new position?

Whilst social media is a wonderful tool for networking and aiding in your job search it can also present some issues, so you must ensure that you’ve double checked and done everything that you can do to boost the things that should be at the top of your search results! E.g. your LinkedIn profile.

Personal social media sites such as Facebook and Instagram can be made private, which will ensure that only certain people, such as close friends and family members can see your updates/posts/pictures. Check your privacy settings on these sites and change them if required.

Your LinkedIn profile is the perfect place to focus your online activity and help boost your online brand. Think of LinkedIn as your online CV, with a few added features that will help with your networking endeavours.

OK, so you might not want everyone to know that you’re looking for a new position (such as your boss!!), but that doesn’t mean that you can’t network with people, in-fact it is important that you do exactly that!

Again, LinkedIn is a very good starting point, and you’ll be able to see who is behind many advertised jobs and connect with them directly through the platform. You may even come across a contact who has, or who knows of an unadvertised job!

Understanding how to utilise LinkedIn for your international job hunt is essential! Sign up for your free LinkedIn appraisal with one of our Client Relationship Managers today.

Successful interviewing is something that takes practice and as many have not interviewed in a long time, sometimes as long as years it is important to start planning and researching early on in preparation for the job interview you’ll likely get (by following the above steps!!).

By doing the research beforehand you’ll be in a much better position to answer any tricky or on-the-spot questions from the interviewer, not to mention you’ll be more relaxed– remember that feeling when you revised for a school exam and the question popped up; “I know this one!!”

Have some practice interviews with friends and family. Get them to run through a fake interview with an existing job posting. There are hundreds of resources online with typical interview questions and tests, so get them to help you out with those. Choose difference scenarios so that when it comes to the real thing you find yourself getting caught out.

A final round up – remember, it’s not a boxing match!

It’s not a boxing match!

The most important things to remember are these:

Plan, plan and plan some more – and create goals that you stick to!

List everything you want from your new position and tailor your job search in accordance

Network with existing and new contacts – you never know what will pop-up out of the wood work

Practice as much as you can – interviews don’t have to be scary!

Remain positive and keep yourself motivated – by following the first 4 points you’ll be helping yourself to stay positive about your job hunt and keep yourself motivated through the hard work that follows

Some say a successful job search can take up to 500 hours, so it’s essential that you ensure every minute is well spent. The more precise and targeted you are the more your proactive-ness and motivation will pay off, and you’ll likely shave a lot of time off your job search.